Swansea the value at Dean court

Back to back wins for Bournemouth and Swansea have lifted them 11 and nine points clear of danger respectively. The Cherries have won only two of their seven home matches against teams currently in the bottom half while the Swans have lost just two of their seven trips to similar teams this term so it’s surprising to see the home side as short as they are. Swansea’s form since Garry Monk’s departure, and particularly since Francesco Guidolin’s arrival, has been pretty solid and they’ve conceded just 13 goals in their last 13 games. Bournemouth have won only one of 19 matches this season when they’ve failed to score at least twice and we’re happy to take them on here.

Asian Handicap Swansea +0.5 - 1pt @ 22/23

Stoke v Southampton

The bookies are struggling to separate these two and with four draws in their last seven meetings that is probably fair. However, Stoke have won the last two of those matches and at home they tend to be good value. They lost their opening two home matches last season but in 31 games here since, Stoke backers would have made more than a 50% profit with 17 wins. Moreover, they’ve won six of nine home matches in this time against teams placed 5th-13th. The Saints have scored just five goals in their last seven matches and scoring on the road has been a problem for a while. They’ve managed just 14 goals in their last 21 away games as they failed to score in 10 and a record of W4-D6-L11 suggests the value is firmly on the home side. Furthermore, Jose Fonte is suspended for Southampton and he’s only failed to start four of 105 games since the start of 2012/13 so we wouldn’t be surprised to see a little extra confusion in the Saints’ backline.
Correct score punters should note that seven of those 11 defeats were by 1-0 or 2-0 scores and Stoke are 8.0 and 14.0 to win by those scores, but we’ll take some cover and keep the draw on our side.